The right choice
by FrancescaBoscorelli
Summary: Joan makes a decision about her feelings for Sherlock that will change their lives forever, AU. Part of the "Moments" series, continuation of "The way we met".


**A/N: this is definitey the longest story of my "Moments" series, THE LONGEST. It also took me three days to finish it because between college and work I just had no time, but here it is now! Also, after this their relationship is "official" so yay! stay tunned for the next one. **

**Enjoy and don't forget to review!**

**hugs to my beta EuphoriaLily**

**Spoilers: episode 1x04.**

* * *

Joan was not someone who got scared easily, or worried easily. She was usually a composed, calm woman even in times of despair and when everyone around her freaked out. She was always the rational, reflective one.

But now everything was different. It'd been over a week since she started working with Sherlock, they had made a routine together, she went everywhere with him and she had learned to deal with the same things he did. And now her whole world had changed and turned around him now. Her whole personality had changed. She worried easily, she was constantly on the verge of having a nervous breakdown when he wasn't around or when he did something utterly crazy.

Just like now.

Her heart beat rapidly inside her chest as she strode around the station, her eyes immediately looking for Captain Gregson, being the only man who could help her in this time of need, she had no one else to turn to. She sighed with relief when she spotted him.

"Ms Watson." he greeted her. She smiled weakly. "I didn't know you and Holmes were stopping by."

"He's not here, just me." she told him.

"Everything okay?" Gregson asked her, eyeing her suspiciously. She figured he had noticed her uneasiness immediately.

"Can we talk privately?" she asked him, exchanging looks between him and Detective Bell at his side. The man nodded and guided her towards his office, closing the door behind them.

She passed back and forth, glaring at her cell phone in her hands as she walked around the room. Gregson watched her in silence, until she spoke quickly, explaining what had happened without giving too much away.

"I haven't heard from him in over three hours." she spoke. "He's not responding to texts, he's not answering his phone."

"All due respect, but you know your boss is a weirdo, right?" Gregson told her, trying to calm her down a little. "He's probably trying to find Jimmy Hoffa in some subway tunnel."

"You don't understand, we have an arrangement." Joan explained "We're not supposed to be apart for more than two hours, and he's never supposed to be unreachable."

"I know you two are pretty close for an assistant and a boss, but how is that even possible?" Gregson questioned her. Joan stopped for a second, stared at him.

"I'm…I'm not his assistant" she confessed. "I…the only reason why we're together all the time is because I live at his place."

Gregson nodded slowly, as if he was finally understanding what the situation was and how their relationship worked. Joan, on the other hand, resumed her nervous pacing.

"Okay. Don't know why you guys couldn't have just told me that but…fine."

"Its…it's not like that" she told him, shaking her head slowly. "We're not 'together' together."

"Okay, what is it like?" Gregson asked, mildly confused.

Joan hesitated. She wasn't sure if her telling Gregson how their relationship worked was going to be of any help, or if Sherlock would be pleased to know she had to revealed part of his troubled past to him. She didn't want to be the cause for Sherlock to be upset.

"I—I can't say. I'm sorry." she whispered.

"Ms Watson, if you want me to help you, you're gonna have to tell me how the story is. Alright?"

She sighed, resuming her pacing in front of Gregson's desk as she thought of the right words to explain her relationship with Sherlock. She didn't want to say it. She wished she could remain quiet and tell Gregson she was probably worried over nothing and that he would come home soon. But she couldn't, her mind drifting to a whole different scenarios, most of them of Sherlock being hurt somewhere and then she thinks it's better to come forward with the truth. There is no other way.

"I'm a sober companion." She spoke quickly "I work with recovering drug addicts. Sherlock is my client. His father hired me to help him stay clean and the only reason why I'm telling you this is because I think he might have relapsed. I need you to help me find him."

.

.

.

_**TWO DAYS EARLIER**_

Joan hugged her cup of warm coffee between her hands, smiling at Emily as they talked. She hadn't had the time to speak or see her after she moved to Sherlock's house, they barely spoke and she knew her friend was worried and probably had million questions to ask her. Mostly about Sherlock and how the living arrangement was going. And her feelings, obviously.

"So, everything is okay?" Emily asked her, taking a small sip of her coffee. "And you know, by 'everything', I mean Sherlock."

"Yes, everything is fine. We're good." Joan responded.

"Good. Are you ready to forget about what you felt for him and to move on?" she hesitated with her question, which immediately made Joan believe she had something planned.

"What do you mean?"

"Look, I know I was the one who told you to continue with your work. That it was probably for the best if you talked to him and since you agreed and figured out it was better to forget about everything you might have felt for the guy, I thought that it was probably a good idea for you to start seeing someone."

"Emily, what did you do?"

"He's just a friend. You might like him." Emily told her, smiling innocently. Before Joan had time to respond, her friend was waving at a man behind her. "Aaron, over here."

The man approached them, smiling warmly at them. Emily got up from her seat and greeted him with a warm hug, to which he responded contently. Joan couldn't deny he was really attractive with curly brown hair and green eyes. He looked charming and sweet.

"Joan, this is my colleague Aaron." Emily spoke "Aaron, this is my best friend, Joan."

"Was…" Joan whispered jokingly.

"Okay, I have water aerobics in 20 minutes." Emily spoke, grabbing her purse while Joan glared at her disapprovingly and tried to stop her. She didn't succeed. "I know you two are strangers, but you're both fantastic and single so…"

Joan couldn't believe it. Her friend was setting her up with another man in her own attempt to force her to forget about her feelings for Sherlock, which to her was crazy and irrational not to mention impossible. She had, in her own way, tried to but failed miserably. Why would Emily think meeting another man would work was beyond her.

In a matter of minutes she was left alone with him.

"I think this is what you call an ambush-setup." Joan told him. Aaron smiled.

"I could totally go for a double-vodka right now." he spoke, a playful smile on his face.

"Do you normally drink spirits before…" she stared at her watch briefly, "…ten?"

"No, but go easy on me. I've just been ambushed."

She laughed, surprised at how natural their moment went and how charming the guy was. She couldn't deny there was chemistry there and he seemed nice enough.

"Vanilla latte for…Aaron?" the barista called. Aaron excused himself politely and got up to get his drink.

She watched him go, hesitating whether she should apologize and leave or stay and see where everything went. Her mind, subconsciously, drifted to Sherlock and her heart skipped a beat. It was as if her heart was trying to remind her the feelings for him were still there.

Her phone beeped. She looked at the screen and noticed a text message from him. She smiled at the undecipherable language he constantly used, but was so him now.

"Are you texting a teenager?" Aaron asked, returning to his seat.

"Full grown adult, actually." she told him. "It's a long story."

"Oh. An ex? Or a current boyfriend your friend doesn't know anything about?" She pondered for a minute. She couldn't tell him her friend was using him for her to forget, that wasn't very polite no matter how honest it was.

"It's complicated." She confessed. "We're not dating or anything, we're just living together." Aaron's eyes opened wide and Joan couldn't help but giggle at his surprise. "Told you it was complicated."

"Well, you can explain it to me. I have time."

They spent the next half hour talking about her living arrangements with Sherlock. She avoided though, explaining the reason of their sudden setup. She was going to give it a try, just because perhaps Emily was right and this was the best choice.

.

.

.

"Met a man I see." Sherlock told her while she stood in front of him at the parlor. "And a handsome one at that."

"This is the part when I ask you how you knew that, right?"

"You put your hair up when you want to look your best." he told her. "You think is more flattering. You're wrong, of course, it's a draw. But it was down when you left for coffee. Ergo you unexpectedly met a man you found attractive."

She immediately pulled her hair down and shifted uncomfortably on her spot. Sherlock's eyes never left her face and she felt somehow intimidated by it. Especially since she noticed his tone had changed while he spoke, he wasn't as eager as he always was when he could read her and got everything right. In fact he looked somewhat sad.

"Yes…his name is Aaron. Emily set us up." she told him.

"Ah. Wise friend." he whispered. "Are you seeing him again?"

"Yeah. He…he asked me out for dinner. Tonight at 7." she told him. He nodded slowly, she felt her chest tight at how disappointed he looked. She wished she would have said no to his invitation.

"Well, good luck with that." he told her. "In the meantime, we have another case to solve."

.

.

.

"Its nearly 7." Sherlock told her. They both sat at his desk, she sipped her cup of hot tea while he focused his mind on picking a lock. She knew she should be getting ready for her date, but she wasn't in the mood to go out with anyone at the moment, especially someone she was barely interested in "You're going to miss your dinner date."

"I'm not going, you need me tonight." she told him, which was not far from the truth. He was dealing with a hard case in his hands and what he needed was help. "Besides…I don't think it's going to work."

"How do you know that if you haven't tried?"

She was tempted to say they both knew the reason why, but she stopped herself.

"Fine. I'll go." she told him, standing up from her seat. "I'm not happy to leave you alone tonight, though."

"If it makes you feel better I'll take a spit test when you get back." he told her. "Go. Have fun with Aaron."

She tries to set her mind to it. She's not quite sure she's going to make it.

.

.

.

She came home early and was happy to. If she was to know the truth behind Aaron she would have never dated him, not in a million years. He was a great man, no doubt about it, but she couldn't stand liars, it was one of the reasons why her relationship with Sherlock never worked, she wasn't about to ignore the tiny little detail he had carefully avoided.

Aaron had texted her repeatedly when she told him she knew, just to explain himself about the whole situation. Joan couldn't stop herself from confronting her friend when she was able to process the information completely.

"_I swear I didn't know."_ Emily told her over the phone.

"Well, he is and he's celebrating his anniversary as well." Joan told her. "Look, Emily, I understand what you're doing is good, I do. But this isn't going to work, not even if he were single. I can't just ignore my feelings for Sherlock."

"_How can you say that if you haven't tried? You know I would never encourage you to date a married man, but you could at least ask him why he didn't tell you."_

"Emily, this isn't going to work…."

"_Just listen to the guy, okay? Just like you did with Sherlock. And if he turns out to be a creep then let him go, you know I would."_

"Fine. But if he's lying again you will let this setting up thing go, okay?"

"_Deal. Call me later to know how everything goes, alright?"_

.

.

.

They met at a café. She only agreed to meet him because she wanted an explanation, not because she needed it.

"Can I get you something?" Aaron offered.

"I'm good."

"How did you find out I was married?" he asked her quickly. She didn't want to explain she had become a cyber stalker upon Sherlock's suggestion, she didn't think he would understand.

"Um, didn't you say you wanted to explain yourself not the other way around?" Joan responded. He shifted in his seat uncomfortably, releasing a nervous laugh in the process.

"Okay, I did lie to you." he told her."I did. But it's not what you think. I volunteer for a place called Shoreline Community Service, we work with people who are seeking political asylum. A while back I helped out a woman from Kosovo, her father was a General at war and when it ended he was shot in the street. She would have been killed had she returned home, but the US wouldn't give her asylum."

"So you married her to keep her in the country. Do you have a relationship?"

"She lives in Hoboken, I check on her sometimes, that's it." he explained. "We can get divorce in a year."

She nodded in understanding. He was being honest, that much she could tell.

"I would have told you, eventually," he explained, "if there was another…time."

She looked down at her hands. He looked interested in her, at least interested enough to feel the need to explain himself. She wished she could feel the same way about him.

"Listen, Aaron, I… wish I could say 'yes'." she spoke. "I wish I could tell you there was going to be another time but I can't."

"There's another guy?" he asked her. Now the interrogation and the explaining was on her.

"Something like that."

"Can I ask you something?" he asked her, visibly sad. She nodded. "If I wouldn't have been married, would this have worked out?"

She wanted to tell him 'yes', but she knew she would be lying to herself and to him. She couldn't force herself to love or care about someone when every chance she got, her mind drifted towards Sherlock.

"No." she murmured. "I'm sorry, Aaron, but this wasn't me. It was Emily's idea to forget about someone, and I thought it was a good one, but…I guess it's not."

"Even if I hadn't lied?"

"Even if you hadn't lied. Even if you were single." she told him. He sighed. "You are a great man, Aaron, you truly are. But I can't lie to my heart, I can't lie to you either. My heart belongs to someone else and so does my mind. Emily knew this, I can't blame her for what happened. She was only trying to help in her own way."

"Well, I can't say I'm not sad about this." he told her. "We could have been great."

"I guess we could have."

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_**TODAY**_

"What makes you think he might have relapsed?" Gregson asked her. Upon her question she noticed he didn't look surprised at the information she was providing at all.

"The heroine from the crime scene the other day, it affected him. It bought some things back."

"Things like what?"

"I don't know. But I'm scared something might have happened and I couldn't do anything to help him." she whispered, trying hard to fight back the tears.

"We're going to find him, okay? Or he'll come back soon." Gregson spoke. She smiled warmly at how he was trying to reassure her and comfort her, though she still couldn't help but feel uneasy.

Then her phone beeped. She looked down at her phone and frowned despite the message received was from the man in question.

"It's Sherlock." Joan spoke, looking at the screen. "He says he's fine, he's heading back home."

"See? There you go. Nothing to worry about."

But she wasn't so sure about it, as she continued to stared blankly at the screen. More precisely at the message she had received.  
See you soon.

They had found him a couple of hours later and she had been right all along about something happening to him. Gregson had told her so, and so did Bell. Joan had never been so happy to see Sherlock, and she had never been so eager to hold him in her arms as she did now. But she couldn't, she had to be professional, she had written rules about it and she was planning to stick to it.

"I can't take a tranquilizer, but it's not too much trouble, I'd like ten minutes hooked up to your oxygen rig." Sherlock spoke to the paramedic, who obviously stared at him in wonder.

"There's plenty of oxygen here." Joan told him as she approached. He smiled warmly at her, her heart melting in the process.

"Pure stuff's better." he responded. "It invigorates and restores. Haven't you heard? I've been through a trauma."

She sat next to him in silence, her heart beating faster as his eyes were still glued to hers. They were close, close enough to feel the heat from their bodies and his even breath.

"That was…uh…very convenient" Sherlock spoke. "The local police showing up when they did. Too convenient to be a coincidence."

"It was the text message." Joan responded. "No emoticons, no indecipherable acronyms. It didn't read like a teenager on sugar high, so I knew it wasn't you."

"I manipulated her into write it for me. I knew she'd never be able to duplicate my flair for our evolving mother tongue." he told her. He looked down at his hands resting on his lap, tapping his fingers against his leg as he spoke, she didn't know why he looked so nervous all of a sudden. "I also knew. I – I hoped that once you realized the message wasn't from me you'd know I was in trouble."

"I did." she responded quickly, briefly recalling in her head how much she had freaked out when she hadn't found him home and how she had practically ran to Gregson for help.

"Well you…you did a great job."

For a moment they fell into silence again. Joan had slowly looked down at her hands, just like he had done, but only because she wouldn't be able to handle his eyes on her any longer without feeling the urge to wrap her arms around him. And also because she felt like she was about to cry, all the emotions and nervousness from the last hour taken its toll on her.

"Look, you should know I went to Captain Gregson when I couldn't find you." She whispered. "I had to…explain some things to him. I'm sorry."

"It's okay, you…you had to."

"You might want to have a talk with him."

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.

.

Sherlock came home a few hours later. Joan waited for him, patiently sitting on the couch. This time she hadn't freaked out when he didn't come home, merely because she was having an internal debate between her heart and her mind. The first one had enough with hiding feelings, with pretending it didn't beat faster whenever he stared at her for too long or whenever he was near. The second one though, told her she should stick to the rules, to forget about the silly crush she had on Sherlock and be a professional woman like she had been all along.

She could follow her brain's advice that told her falling for him would not be easy and would only make matters more complicated. But she didn't want to. She was tired. Tired of hiding and ignoring everything. Losing Sherlock, even for a brief moment, had proved her she cared about him more than she could control and told her feelings instead of banishing they were growing. But most importantly she didn't want to do anything to make them stop.

The door opened, she turned around to watch Sherlock walk in and drop his keys on the small table by the door. She didn't move, she simply watched him as he walked towards her and stood in the middle of the room. He looked as if there was a weight off his shoulder.

"How did it go with Gregson?" she asked him. He shrugged.

"Good. Turns out he already knew about me. Always did." he responded.

"That's a good thing, right?"

"Yeah, it is. He hasn't 'fired' me yet, so I think we're okay."

She nodded, shifting on her seat. He noticed how suddenly she was very uncomfortable, almost teary as they fell into a silence. He sensed something must have happened to her while he was gone, but he feared asking her in case she broke down and cried. She looked like was about anyways.

Still he couldn't resist his curiosity.

"Is there something wrong?" Sherlock asked. Joan lifted her head long enough to look at him, but didn't speak. She just stared for a few seconds; the sadness he saw before still remained.

"Watson?" he encouraged her to speak.

"You know, I've been thinking, about all of this." she spoke, her eyes were anywhere but on him. She thought avoiding his gaze would be the easiest way to say what she wanted to say. "About the rules, about you, about me, about us and you know what? It's stupid. Everything I said, all the reason I made up in my head not to make this work, because all have been lies. I can't help it. I can't stop it. I can't make them stop, my feelings for you haunt me every single day and I can't make them disappear. I've tried. Emily made me try, too, she set me up with Aaron for me to succeed. Obviously it didn't work, because I didn't want to make it work. Because you're in my brain and in my heart and I just can't make you go away."

She sighed, her eyes becoming watery and her lips quivering. He listened in silence, too stunned to say anything coherent, but also too familiar with his own feelings. Because he had been avoiding them too, he had been ignoring his feelings for her and avoiding being too forward just because she had asked him too. But God, how he felt about her. Joan was like no other woman, she was smart, kind, sweet and she truly cared about him, which was a big deal to him.

"I…I'm sorry." she whispered finally, standing up from her position on the couch, lifting her head enough to look at a very silent Sherlock. He had chosen the wrong time to be quiet. "I…I just wanted to say this, I needed it. But…you need to rest. It's been a long day and I'm sure Gregson will call you to have you give a statement tomorrow so…."

She walked passed him, taking slow steps away from Sherlock but before she could go far he had grabbed her hand forcing her to turn around. Their eyes met as he pulled her towards him, closer to his body, his eyes drifted towards her lips for a brief moment and Joan's heart skipped a beat. There was something so endearing in the way he watched her that warmed her deep within, it was if he was trying to tell her something with his look, something he couldn't quite voice.

Then his head moved gradually towards her, their nose touching briefly, his hands travelling slowly towards her face and her eyes closed at the contact. His lips came slowly to hers, matching with hers in a soft tender kiss. Her arms sneaked around his shoulders, pushing herself considerably closer to him, feeling the heat of his body radiating and the firmness of his chest. The kiss, which was tender and warm, increased to a passionate one. Sherlock tasted tentatively with his tongue, and Joan opened her mouth slowly with a low moan.

They kissed for what it seemed to be minutes, Sherlock's hands had moved towards the small of her back and Joan's hands played with the hairs at the base of his neck. Eventually they pulled away when air became necessary, both breathing heavily.

"We could make it work." he whispered, resting his forehead against hers, caressing her cheeks with his palm as he spoke. "I want to make this work."

"Me too." she breathed.

"I have to warn you, though. I'm not very good when it comes to relationships. I might do things wrong from time to time."

"Well, I'm not an expert either, but we can make it work. I know we can."

"Okay…I'm gonna kiss you again now, if that's fine with you."

"I don't think you should ask."

Their lips crashed again and Joan felt content for the first time in years.

**THE END.**

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